Gaza court sentences man to death for collaboration

GAZA CITY (Ma’an) -- A 45-year-old man in Gaza was sentenced to death on Wednesday on charges of collaborating with Israel, Ma'an's reporter said.

A Gaza court also sentenced the man's 40-year-old wife to 10 years in prison for her part in the alleged collaboration charges.

The court said the couple, from Beit Lahiya, provided intelligence to Israel which led to the assassination of two Palestinian leaders of the Al-Qassam and Al-Aqsa Martyrs brigades militant groups.

In July, the Ministry of Interior in the Gaza Strip said three men convicted of murder were hanged.

A total of 14 Palestinians have now been executed since the Islamist group Hamas seized the Gaza Strip in 2007 from Western-backed President Mahmoud Abbas's Fatah faction.

Gaza courts have handed out 30 death sentences since 2007, many of them to people convicted of helping Israeli security forces.

The Palestinian Center for Human Rights called for legal reform to enact a "unified penal code that is in line with the spirit of international human rights instruments, especially those pertaining to the abolition of the death penalty."